What If Sex Were Like This?

A few weeks ago, I wrote a post with the same title on The Generous Husband. My goal was to help men understand some of the sexual frustrations and realities of being female. If he understands, he can sympathise and work to make it easier and better for you. I figure what’s sauce for the gander is sauce for the goose, so imagine sex for you was different. Imagine it was more like this:

You think about sex a dozen times a day minimum, without any decision to think about it or any triggers.

Seeing your husband without his shirt on makes you so horny you can’t remember what you were doing five seconds ago.

Holding him close causes such arousal you ache between the legs.

Really great sex at night can result in you waking up as aroused or more aroused as you were last night.

When you see his penis, it takes all your will power not to just grab it.

Once foreplay starts, you literally cannot think about anything but sex.

Arousal causes you to get so swollen you can’t put your legs together, and there’s no ignoring it till it eventually goes away.

Lying next to him in bed when you want sex and he doesn’t is physically and emotionally painful.

Sometimes it’s so good you can’t hold back, and you climax a minute into intercourse even though you would really like it to go on and on.

When it’s been awhile, you read “I want sex” into most of his words and actions, regardless of if it’s there or not.

If you experienced sex in this way, do you think you’d feel differently about sex? Would you be so interested sex you would seem obsessed? What if your husband could easily go weeks without sex and had no concept of the sexual struggles you faced?

Most men will identify with most of what I said above. Many will identify with all of it. Is it any wonder men are so eager for sex all the time?

I dare you to print out the list above and give it to your husband. Ask him which of those things he has ever experienced. Ask him which he’s experienced in the last month. Then ask him what you can do to help.

~ Paul – My XX wife gets it, which makes sex so much less of a problem!

Related Resource: Christian Sex Class recently posted some thoughts on how and what to discuss about sex – Talk About What?

While there certainly are women who identify with most of these, I doubt it’s nearly as many as you suggest. The differences are far more than having a higher drive, and many are rooted in differences in how men and women’s brains work.

I can relate to all but one and that’s only because my anatomy is different…

This scenario pretty much describes me and my husband. Mostly his lack of interest is due to long work hours, not necessarily lack of desire and that is something I have figured out finally. But it’s still frustrating to be turned down often and/or just not sense he has any urgency for sex more than once a week.

Ah well, I’ll just keep admiring him with his shirt off and hoping tonight’s the night… Amy recently posted…Paradoxical thinking

I’m a woman and this article is just more proof that I must be a freak. Every article I read makes me seem like the man. I want to make love so much more often than my husband does. It’s awful. It makes me feel ugly, undesirable and worthless. Twice a week is a big week for us. I don’t know why I don’t attract my husband like other wives do theirs, and it’s awful. He says he finds me attractive, but actions speak FAR louder than words.
This is why I spend most nights alone on the couch. My husband says he hates this and wants me to sleep with him in our bed, but for what? It’s easier to be alone than to be near him, desiring him, and knowing he doesn’t feel the same way about me.

The only reason a man would not be pulled to make closeness sexual would be complete lack of attraction. Therefore he is not attracted to me. Therefore why be close at all. It is really very simple logic.

I can think of a number of other reasons a man would not choose to have sex. There are a number of reasons why a man would feel little or no sex drive, most of them having nothing to do with the woman he shares his bed with.
I can’t tell you it’s not a lack of attraction, but I can assure you that is only one of a great many possibilities.Paul Byerly recently posted…Becoming Yourself Sexually

Dear Me, I agree with Paul, there are other reasons. For the sake of your marriage, it would be good to try to explore and understand what’s going on in your particular marriage. After a couple of years reading all the marriage-related material I can get my hands on, I have developed a theory about very-low-drive husbands. Again, just my theory, so take it or leave it. I believe there are 3 issues that account for at least 90% of problems with a man’s sex drive toward his wife.

1. Porn or other sex addiction has warped his view of women, and of sex itself, and even his sex drive. Like any other addiction, as time goes on you need a bigger and bigger hit in order to get your fix. At some point, “normal” is just not enough.

2. Low testosterone levels. A great resource is “lowtwife.com”

3. Issues regarding respect in the marriage. There are two subcategories: a) He doesn’t feel respected in the marriage. An excellent resource is “Love and Respect” by Emerson Eggerichs, also see “The Respect Dare” by Nina Roesner. or… b) He is afraid of *losing* your respect (i.e., performance anxiety.)

Then of course, please consider that it could be none of these. Just because his sex drive is not the same as yours does not mean there is something wrong with it, and it certainly does not make it personal about your attractiveness. If you’re having sex about once a week, you’re not in a sexless marriage. You say you feel like a “freak” due to your higher sex drive, but maybe your husband is also just outside the bell curve of what is “normal” for men. Low drive is only low by comparison to someone else. Maybe there is nothing fundamentally wrong with his drive, it is just a difference for the two of you to learn to work out together.

#1 – Absolutely
#2 – A new study suggests low T does not cause lack of sex, lack of sex causes low T. A lot more study needs to be done on testosterone. Amount other things we really have no idea what “normal” should be. It looks like normal is a wide range, and the trick if knowing what is normal for each man. Giving a man more T than he needs does nothing helpful and can cause great harm.
#3 – Respect is a big one. Men turn from sex they desperately want because they do not feel respected. Likewise for performance anxiety or wanting something he thinks she will feel is wrong or gross. When oral sex became a big deal in the 60’s there were storied of middle-aged men going to prostitutes for the first time to have oral, thinking their wife would be offended at the suggestion. I have no idea how often this really happened, but it makes the point.

Another issue is sex drive is not just what a man – or woman – expresses towards their spouse. You have both men and women who choose to masturbate more often than they choose to have sex with their spouse. They have a good drive, they just do not use all of it with their spouse. The reasons for this are many, and may have little or nothing to do with the spouse. This is a hidden problem because when a person complains about their spouse being low drive no one counters with “I want sex, just not with you”.

To me drive is not, or should not, be the issue. A man or a woman with little or no drive can give their spouse excellent and frequent sex if they CHOOSE to do so. We do many things for our spouse because they want us to, how did sex become different? Many who decided to just do it found they started enjoying it more and more, and wanting it more and more.Paul Byerly recently posted…Friday Flashback: For Her Body Only

I can relate to all the points in the above article, except as a woman, multiple orgasms does not make things end if I climax quickly.
@Me. I can relate to everything you’re saying. I’m working through similar issues. Sleeping on the couch is not an option for me. I’m trying to understand and help ‘bridge the gap’, and I know if roles were reversed, I would feel badly if my husband slept on the couch. I have gone to the living room to cry or exercise or otherwise try to work through my frustration, and am hoping soon to find a way to deal with this issue that works for both of us. I don’t get it either. How can I be attractive, but he isn’t attracted to me?

If a man lacks sex drive, his attraction to his wife will not lead to sex. He may enjoy her company, may enjoy laying close to her, but does not feel the desire or need to have sex. If he has some drive, he will occasionally be moved to have sex, but not often.Paul Byerly recently posted…Becoming Yourself Sexually

If a man lacks sex drive, would he do double takes at women while out, sometimes to the point of forgetting what we were talking about? I’m seriously asking. I feel like the lack of sex drive is a lack of desire for me. Perhaps if I looked like someone who could turn his attention like this he’d have a high or higher drive. This has only happened a few times, but it does make me wonder…if I looked like (fill in the blank), would he get aroused more often and want sex more often?

As I said in a comment above, drive is not as simple as we want to make it.

Being visually hooked is hard-wired for men. Most of us learn to be in control of it, some don’t bother. The awareness does not indicate arousal. Arousal may or may not follow the looking, but the looking is not driven just by desire.

The other issue is what a man does when he feels desire. Is it enough desire to push him to do something? If he has low drive it may not be enough to cause him to take action. If he has higher drive but is tried and stressed sex may be more effort than it’s worth. Some men just don’t bother, others masturbate secretly. Age is a big factor here, it becomes easier for a man to push sex aside as he gets older. Some men more than others.

I can’t tell you if your husband is or is not attracted to you, but I can tell you there are other valid and common reasons men do what you say he is doing.Paul Byerly recently posted…Friday Flashback: For Her Body Only

Thanks for sharing this article. My impression is that some of these are less prominent as a man ages. Libido slows down but they also have years of practice stifling desire/response. (Going to the blackboard is an issue in middle school but rarely in middle age, is what I’ve been told.) It’s impossible to know exactly how someone else experiences arousal or why.

The mixed messages we get from society are hard for women to understand. The feminists would have us believe that men are animals who can’t control themselves. Men themselves tell me it’s not quite like that (and I believe them). But realistic articles such as this one (and books) suggest that they are, um, easily aroused. Regardless of the actual situation, as the earlier commenters mentioned, it is difficult for a gal when her husband doesn’t show many of these characteristics (or always needs the wife to initiate). Although my husband says as he ages his arousal is more like a woman’s – he’s willing, but it takes more time to warm up the engine (and I truly feel for my husband because it can’t be a fun thing to have such a huge part of who you are not function quite like it used to), it’s also true that he’s married to a middle-aged woman, who looks okay for her age but has more sags and wrinkles and pounds than a 20-year-old. And we get that mixed message as well – that our age/body doesn’t matter – but all the evidence we’re surrounded by daily suggests otherwise.

I guess I don;t have a point, except thanks for the article and for all you do.

I think all most all of us are much more easily aroused than virtually all women. The issue then is what we do with it. This is where self control and decency come in.
Age certainly has an impact on male sexuality. I suspect many men confuse the physical and mental/emotional changes, “blaming” one for the other. Lack of erection does not mean lack of arousal, but I fear some men take it as such. They are so used to seeing their penis as a flag announcing arousal they assume no flag means no arousal, and they shut off or deny the arousal they could feel if they allowed themselves. Beyond that, some men feel less masculine without the fast raising of the flag, and I know it is not uncommon for a man to avoid sex because he does not think his body will do what he thinks it should do. Some of these men turn to masturbation, others just try to put sex out of their minds.
It would be nice if we could all learn to identify arousal based on what is happening in our minds. If we accept that, our bodies can be convinced to go along!Paul Byerly recently posted…Who Does God Say You Are?

“…learn to identify arousal based on what is happening in our minds.”
This is so right on!

My hubby is a wonderful caring loving man and although I have absolutely no doubts he loves and desires me more than anything, it can be discouraging when I feel I’m the one thinking about and wanting to make love more than him.
But the other night while we lay cuddling afterwards he said how he hoped to do that again soon and then went on to say how hard it is when part of him really wants to but the ‘other’ part of him doesn’t always cooperate.
Wow! That right there made a huge difference in how I see things.

Where I often would think he just is not attracted to me anymore, or just doesn’t really like sex, maybe it’s all too much work and he just doesn’t want to…etc, etc, etc…I try to remember what he said that night and realize that he truly does desire sex but things don’t work like they once did at the age of 60.

So I will remember to extend grace and keep loving through unmet expectations, because honestly it’s often those expectations of what we think SHOULD be that kill our desire for what is.

Ladies, don’t quit on your man. If he truly is loving and caring towards you in all other aspects of your marriage put aside those destructive thoughts which creep in, find your worth in the Lord and keep on loving him.
Yes, the pain is real of not feeling desired but he may be feeling pain too for different reasons and the more you pull away the more he will also pull away.Amy recently posted…Paradoxical thinking

I an certainly relate. There are times after a very long hard day when I feel a need to be near my wife. That may or may not lead to a desire for sex, but even if it does I may not feel up to the effort it would require. I’ve often wished we could have sex without moving!Paul Byerly recently posted…Your Dreams and Your Marriage